


Benediction

by eternaleponine



Series: Ghosts That We Knew [6]
Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Deleted Scene, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-28
Updated: 2013-08-28
Packaged: 2017-12-24 23:14:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/945823
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eternaleponine/pseuds/eternaleponine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is a "deleted scene" from <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/531381/chapters/942536">Ghosts That We Knew</a>.  It is <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/531381/chapters/1844975">Chapter 59</a> from Natasha's point of view.</p><p>(Although it is not strictly necessary, I do recommend reading Chapter 59 first.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Benediction

He looked so young when he was asleep. Not that he didn't look young otherwise – he _was_ young, they both were, but too often both of them felt older than their years, too much life lived in too short a time – but in sleep, at least for the moment, he was peaceful, all of the worry and the pain erased.

She wanted to touch him, to trace lines of his brows and cheekbones, the curve of his lips, but she didn't want to wake him. It was too early for that; the sun was only just beginning to crest the horizon. She wanted to kiss him, wanted him to kiss her back, ached with wanting it.

She wasn't supposed to feel like this. Was she? After all that had happened, she wasn't supposed to feel like this. She wasn't supposed to _want_ like this. After everything she'd been through, she was supposed to be repulsed by it, wasn't she? She was supposed to be broken by it, wasn't she? 

That's what you always saw on TV, in the movies, read in books and in the newspaper. She was a victim, tainted, damaged goods, and that was that, end of story. 

No one ever talked about what came after. How you dealt with it when your heart kept beating, beating harder around a particular someone who gave every indication of feeling the same way. No one talked about how your soul could be battered but not broken, and how in spite of it all, in spite of all the unwanted touches, all of the things that had been forced on you that you never wanted and that you might never forget no matter how much you wanted to, you could still want to be touched. You could still want to be held, to be kissed, to...

Clint's eyes opened, and he smiled at her. "Morning," he said. He brushed his nose against hers. 

_Good morning._ There was barely room between them to form the signs. 

He reached out and tucked her hair behind her ear, his fingers brushing along her jaw. He did it all the time. It sent a shiver – a good one – through her every time. _It is, isn't it?_

She rolled her eyes. _Idiot._

_I love you too._

They'd used that sign before, that quick flash of the combined I-L-Y, but for some reason when he moved it between the two of them in the sign for 'same' it struck her deep, froze her in place with her breath caught in her throat. Something in that acknowledgment of the fact that it was shared, that he knew...

And then she slid her arms around him and kissed him, and kissed him again until they were warm and tangled and breathless with it, and it was nothing like that first time, when they'd almost come together for all the wrong reasons and he'd stopped her and was that the moment when she'd fallen even as she was falling apart? 

In a pause for air, Clint reached for the nightstand. Natasha turned to look and saw he was reaching for his hearing aids. She caught his hand, pressed her lips to his palm, pressed his palm to her chest where she was sure he could feel her heart pounding. _No,_ she signed. _No. This is you and me, exactly as we are._

Because if she was going to make herself vulnerable, expose all of the part of her that were or might be broken, so was he. It was what had gotten them this far, after all.

He didn't argue, just slid his fingers into her hair, cradling the back of her head as he kissed her again, and again, and again. 

It was slow, almost teasing, and he made no demands. He didn't ask for anything she wasn't ready to give, and he knew somehow where all those lines were drawn and stayed safely on the side of them that too many others had crossed without ever even seeing them, or probably just not caring when they did.

He watched her, and she had never had anyone look at her like that, like they not only saw her but saw _into_ her, and not only saw but _understood_ and when she tensed he stopped, waited, one breath in and one breath out, another, a third, and the moment past and the tension eased...

... or it didn't, and it wasn't his face anymore, and it wasn't his hands, and...

"'Tasha."

A word. A name. 

"'Tasha."

 _Her_ name, like a summons...

And it was him, with his eyes that saw all of the darkness in her, all of the fear, and his hands that drew it to the surface, and his voice that banished it with a word...

"'Tasha."

... like a benediction.

She took a breath and let it go, and let herself give in, surrender, say yes. Whatever happened tomorrow, next week, next year, this moment was theirs and no one could take it from them. 

And the moment stretched and time lost meaning, everything lost meaning except him-her- _them_ and it was overwhelming in the best way she'd never imagined.

 _I didn't know,_ she told him with shaking hands when she could put words together again. _I didn't know it could be like this._

_Neither did I._

He looked so surprised by it that she couldn't help smiling, and he smiled back, and then she started to laugh because she didn't know what else to do because she really hadn't known, she really hadn't, and it was more than she could contain, and then he started laughing and it was all over.

She didn't know how long it took for them to get themselves back under control. She didn't care. It felt good to laugh. She couldn't remember the last time she'd laughed until it hurt, and maybe she never had, and this was why him, why not someone else, because with him she'd found joy, and hope, and before those had been words that had only ever applied to other people.

She looked at him, straight into his eyes, straight through him. _You really do, don't you?_ But it wasn't really a question. It hadn't been in a long time.

Clint shrugged. _So do you._

And it was as simple and as complicated as that.


End file.
